


The Reading Nook

by EAWeek



Category: Real Person Fiction
Genre: F/M, Ice Skating, Introspection, Nostalgia, Olympics, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-02-22
Packaged: 2019-11-03 20:51:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17885012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EAWeek/pseuds/EAWeek
Summary: Did she really want to live in this house, the years swirling past her windows like leaves in autumn, edging into middle age while she waited for something that might never happen?  Or would she rather take her chances on the wide-open highway of her life’s next adventure?





	The Reading Nook

**Author's Note:**

> This is a short fic, heavy on exposition, with very little dialogue. Most of it was inspired by the House & Home video tour of Tessa Virtue's beautiful house. (Video is still on You Tube, for anyone who hasn't seen it).

**The Reading Nook**

**By E.A. Week**

Sleet rattled against the window, intruding on her slumber.  Tessa flinched, knowing soon the clock radio alarm would start playing, and she must drag herself from the cocoon of sleep, don her practice clothes, and venture out into the freezing, miserable darkness of pre-dawn Michigan winter.  Then she blinked, the dream dissolving around her.  She listened for a few moments to the noise that had awakened her, thousands of tiny ice spicules, driven by wind against the glass panes.  She sat up and twisted around.  The snowstorm had been underway since the small hours, and as the forecast had promised, it was now mixing with sleet before temperatures fell and the precipitation shifted back to snow.

She picked up the iPad, the newest model, gleaming sleek and white, which had slid off her lap.  Shivering, she opened the app that controlled the house’s HVAC system and adjusted the temperature setting.  With an almost inaudible hum, the furnace kicked in and warm air began gusting from a nearby vent.  Tessa shifted the reading lamp, which provided the only illumination at the moment.  The clock on the iPad informed her it was 3:50 PM, and already a kind of dreary twilight was settling over London.  Tessa was glad she had nowhere to go.  She’d known the weather was going to be lousy and so had planned this Sunday as a “Tessa Day.”  Beyond the glow of the lamp, the big house lay mostly in darkness.  Tessa knew she should get up and turn on more lights, but she couldn’t overcome inertia.  She adjusted the blanket that lay over her legs and sighed, lying back against the cushions of the big chair.

Funny how her training dreams always took place in Canton, never the rinks in Waterloo or Ilderton or even Montreal.  Her sleeping mind went back, without fail, to the Arctic Edge, when she and Scott were teenagers; even more telling, dream-Marina was still working with dream-Igor.  Tessa supposed this quirk represented times that now seemed happy, innocent, uncomplicated, free of worry.  Hindsight and nostalgia always imbued the past with finer qualities than it had possessed in reality.

One thing she knew for certain, the dream couldn’t possibly represent a wish to return to training.  Those days were gone now, taking with them the emotional stress, the physical grind.  But in unguarded moments, when her mind was free to drift at will, it wanted to return to that particular time and place.  Perhaps this wasn’t surprising: Scott and Tessa had spent so much time in Canton, and those had been such formative years.  Igor and Marina, after all, had transformed the two talented youngsters into Olympic champions.

Tessa’s fingertips grazed over the smooth, cool surface of the tablet: weather, hockey scores, politics, local gossip.  She tapped the Kindle app, bringing up the book she’d been trying to read, an essay collection by David Sedaris.  During the years of training and traveling, constantly on the move, Tessa had often wished for more time to read.  But now, with leisure at her disposal, Tessa only wanted to watch videos on You Tube: movie trailers, cats and dogs, makeup tutorials.  For some ridiculous reason, Tessa had become obsessed with gymnastics from the 1970s, watching video after grainy video of Eastern European teenagers flinging themselves around the archaic pieces of apparatus.  She knew she should occupy herself with more intellectually enriching fare, and in a recent fit of academic determination, she’d downloaded the entire Jane Austen oeuvre onto the iPad, but she’d yet to read a single page of even one novel.

(ii)

She had long recognized the absurdity of owning such a large house.  One person didn’t really need all this space.  No sooner had the renovations been completed and the decorating done, Tessa had gone away to Montreal to train; later, she’d been so busy traveling that it seemed she never had the time to relax and enjoy her house: it was a place to store her possessions, but she felt she never _lived_ there.  Nothing embodied this irony more than the reading nook.  The area had been created when a prior remodeling had left an awkward, sawed-off hallway, too small to be another room, but too large to waste.  The little nook had charmed Tessa, and now the space was just as she had envisioned it: a cozy alcove where one could laze around reading.

Except she almost never did; Tessa could count on her fingers the number of times she’d sat down in the big, cushy chair with its matching footrest and absorbed herself in the printed word.  And whenever she did, like today, she’d fallen asleep.  Maybe the chair was the problem—too comfortable.  But Tessa knew that if she went anywhere else in the house—her bedroom, the family room downstairs—the results would be the same.  Reading had such a somnolent effect on her, it was like literary Ambien.

She’d had the best intentions for making today a reading day.  The previous night, Tessa had hosted a post-holiday dinner party for her parents, her siblings, their spouses and children.  There had been drinks and music in the big kitchen, followed by dinner in her beautiful dining room, extra leaves added to the table to allow seating for the crowd.  After dinner, everyone had flopped out in the family room for coffee and desserts, and they’d watched the game together.  The Leafs had lost to the Kings in overtime, which generated much loud derision, but the evening had been warm with happiness and love.  Her company didn’t leave until after midnight, her parents the last to depart, and Tessa had stayed up another two hours cleaning the downstairs.

She’d slept late, awakened near noon, fixed herself a voluptuous brunch, and had adjourned upstairs with her tablet and coffee, relishing the decadence of staying in her pajamas all day.  The half-empty coffee cup sat on the table beside her, and the Kindle app told her she’d read only 1% of the Sedaris book.  Tessa had no difficulty identifying the cause of her funk: a mix of boredom, restlessness, and jittery anticipation.

(iii)

Two weekends ago, on Christmas eve, she had Scott had skated together for the final time.  They both had wanted this occasion to be specific, not some random last stop of a tour.  They’d kept touring and performing for the four years after Pyeongchang; there had been a lot of publicity, to say nothing of the endorsement opportunities, leading up to the 2022 Games.  In the spring, Scott and Tessa had joined the generation of younger Olympians for the Canadian Stars on Ice tour.  That summer, they’d toured in Europe and Asia.  In the autumn, there had been another Thank You, Canada tour.  People everywhere still loved to see Tessa and Scott perform, and the money was good.  But they both knew that would be their last tour.

The Christmas Eve performance had been small, intimate, skated in the Ilderton rink, with only family, friends, and neighbors present, members of their close-knit community.  The event had not been publicized.  Tessa had worn a high-collared, backless dress of deep green; Scott had worn black trousers and a plain white shirt.  As the teary-eyed crowd had watched, rapt, Tessa and Scott had glided across the ice to the strains of the Raveonette’s “Christmas Song,” the two skaters seeming to levitate on clouds of whooshing synths and breathy vocals.

_All the lights are coming on, now_

_How I wish that it would snow, now_

_I don’t feel like going home, now_

_I wish that I could stay_

Even now, Tessa found it difficult to adjust to the empty space in her life that had been occupied by training, by skating, by competing.  By Scott.  That going forward, there would not be the daily scent of his sweat, the pressure of his body against hers, the strength of his arms lifting her.  The feel of his hand in hers, his breath gusting against her face.  His eyes.  His smile.

_I wish that I could walk_

_I wish that I could walk_

_You home_

The song had ended, though the spell it cast had lingered.  Tessa and Scott had embraced on the ice, to the sounds of their loved ones crying and cheering themselves hoarse.  Tessa thought again and again of how it had felt to unlace her skates, take off her costume, peel off her tights, knowing that this was it, the last time.  And it felt good.  Sad, but good.  It felt right.  It was time: to move on to new things, to explore new horizons.

(iv)

She tried to avoid social media around Christmas, but nevertheless she’d clicked by chance on a link to a photo she wished she’d rather not seen: Meryl and Fedor, Charlie and Tanith, posed together for the holidays with their kids and their dogs.  Tessa didn’t feel angry or jealous or resentful; she only experienced a diffuse kind of melancholy.  She was well into her thirties now, with no husband, no kids.  She knew that both Kate and Alma had hoped… well, they’d hoped there would be a marriage by now, and grandkids.  A lot of people had expected the same, once Scott and Tessa’s competitive days ended, and were disappointed and perplexed that it hadn’t.

Tessa had had some relationships, but all of them had fizzled into nothingness.  There were many reason for that, but they all came down to one thing: none of those men had been the one she wanted.

(v)

The opportunity to join the Toronto Dance Theater, a modern dance company, had come like a shock of lightning.  Christopher House had introduced himself to Scott and Tessa after one of their shows in 2019 and had asked with some shyness if he could choreograph a number for them.  Jennifer Swan had often praised his work, and so Tessa and Scott had said yes.  That collaboration, an abstract piece set to music from the _Low Symphony_ by Phillip Glass, had become an instant sensation.  And then Chris had asked Tessa if she wanted to join the company.  She’d start by taking classes and rehearsing, then she’d tackle a couple of performances during the company’s summer tour.  If all went well, Tessa would become a full-time company member in the fall.  She’d seen some of the TDT’s shows and was excited by their diverse, unconventional repertoire.

She knew this represented an extraordinary prospect: most companies hired youngsters into their ranks, not adults of almost 34.  But Tessa’s vast experience gave her a stronger foundation than even the most well-trained novice.  She could not pass up the chance to venture down a road that she’d thought would forever be her “path not taken;” at the most difficult moments during her skating years, she’d lamented the childhood choice she’d made not to pursue a career in ballet—although God only knew what dancing _en pointe_ would have done to her legs.  And now, incredible as it seemed, she might be able to fulfill her longstanding dream after all.

She already had signed a lease on an apartment in Toronto and purchased furniture for it.  This week she’d start packing, and the following weekend, weather permitting, she’d be on the move again.  Christopher wanted her to start working out with the company as soon as their holiday recess ended.  Tessa regarded her home with mournful eyes: it seemed she’d just gotten comfortable in the house, and it was time to leave it again.

(vi)

She’d told Scott about her plans two months earlier.  They’d been providing commentary for the CBC’s coverage of the 2022 Grand Prix series, and by November, the arrangement with the Dance Theater had been finalized.  She and Scott had been having dinner at the hotel between events at Skate Canada, and it had seemed like a good moment.

“Tess, that’s amazing!” Scott had said, almost shouting with gladness.  “It’s so perfect!”

“You really think?” Tessa had asked with a short, nervous laugh.

“You’ll rock it!  They’re lucky to have you.”

After their meal, he’d hugged her, and in his embrace, Tessa could feel relief.  She didn’t need psychic perception to discern the cause: with Tessa’s future settled, Scott could more openly pursue other relationships.  The realization galled her, that her career plans had freed him from whatever obligation he felt to spare her feelings.  She imagined his girlfriends also would be just as happy to have Tessa—the constant woman in Scott’s life—living and working in another city.

It wasn’t fair; it sucked, but there wasn’t much Tessa could do about it.

Apart from Scott and her family, she hadn’t told anyone about the apprenticeship, and they all respected her urge to be circumspect.  In particular, Tessa did not want word to get out on social media—oh, it would, as soon as someone spotted her leaving the studio in Toronto, but Tessa was hoping to buy some time.  She wanted to ratchet down expectations that she would morph into a modern dance superstar overnight; if her first performances failed to live up to insane expectations, if her attempts at a dance career fizzled out, she could step away with a minimum of fanfare, and with luck, no regrets or recriminations.

(vii)

In addition to seeing the company perform, Tessa had been able to meet the dancers after one of their shows.  Everyone had been friendly and welcoming; if any of them resented the country’s Olympic darling joining their ranks, they’d had the good sense to keep their misgivings to themselves.  Tessa did not expect to have any special treatment, to be given featured roles right away.  She would work her way up; she’d start as an ensemble performer and earn her kudos like everyone else.

Of course, she would be dancing with men.  The Dance Theater was split about 50-50 along gender lines, and Tessa admired the acrobatic partnering in the dances she’d seen.  She sensed this would be one of the biggest adjustments: working with new partners.  There would be someone else—someone other than Scott—to lift her, turn her, balance her, support her.  There would be someone else holding her hand.  Other than the sheer, monumental upheaval of beginning a completely new career, of leaving the skating world behind, Tessa knew she would find this the most difficult thing to get used to.  She’d do it—there was little in Tessa’s life she hadn’t accomplished, once she’d set her mind to it—but a tiny corner of her soul wailed in protest at the very idea.

Before she could become maudlin—or worse, second-guess her plans—Tessa threw aside the blanket.  She knew she’d made the right decision, but during this limbo phase, with so many lingering ghosts of her not-quite-yet former life, it was too easy for doubts to creep in.  She padded down the hallway, switching on lights.  First, she’d fix herself another coffee.  Then she’d indulge in a couple of decadent hours in her bathroom, another of the house’s luxuries she never had enough time to enjoy.  She’d soak in the big tub, deep-condition her hair, treat her skin with a mask, give herself a pedicure.  An at-home spa treatment was like chocolate: the cure for most ills.  Tessa got the hot water running and threw in a bath bomb from Lush, the one scented with apricots and cream.

(viii)

A little over a week later, early in the morning, Kate saw her daughter off.  Kate had spent the night in a guest room, and she’d been up at six with Tessa, helping her pack the last-minute luggage.  Kate and Jim always looked after the house in Tessa’s absence.  Now Tessa’s neat little hybrid SUV sat parked in the driveway, loaded to the rafters and ready to go.

“Are you all right?” Kate asked for what seemed like the millionth time.  A host of other questions lay behind that inquiry: _Are you sure you’re doing the right thing?  Will you be homesick?  Can you manage alone?  What about Scott?  Are you just giving up on him so easily?_   Tessa found her mother’s concern equal parts touching and ridiculous.  She’d been more or less on her own since her teens—nearly twenty years now.  But she smiled: parents always fretted most over the youngest kid, after all.

They both glanced down the road, which sat empty and quiet under the bright, cold winter sunlight.  In fiction, this was the inevitable moment when the hero would come tearing onto the scene, breathless with apologies and declaring his undying love.  But no car engine, no sound at all, disturbed the tranquil suburban morning.  In reality, Scott was probably still snoring in bed next to his latest inamorata.  And Tessa was surprised to realize she felt okay about that.

She glanced up at her house; from here, she could see the reading nook window, and she experienced another pang of yearning.  She knew she could stay here, in London, but did she really want to live in this house, the years swirling past her windows like leaves in autumn, edging into middle age while she waited for something that might never happen?  Or would she rather take her chances on the wide-open highway of her life’s next adventure?

She gave her mother a hug.  “Dance for life,” she quoted.  “Life is dance.”

“Isn’t it, though?” Kate said, squeezing her daughter tightly and kissing her cheek.

Tessa hopped into the SUV and started the engine.

“Call me when you get there,” said Kate, as though Tessa didn’t have a cell phone and couldn’t call her at any time, as if Tessa were voyaging out into the wilds of Saskatchewan, instead of the familiar two-hour drive to Toronto.

“Love you,” said Tessa, and she threw the vehicle into gear, humming down the road into the future.

**~The End~**

 

Note: the Toronto Dance Theater is an actual, real dance company, but the use of it (and artistic director Christopher House) in this story is completely fictitious.


End file.
